mahayana vehicle

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Chapter 2

The Mahayanahe Buddha taught the Theravada path to beginning

students because it was suitable for them. The second

vehicle (Skt. yana) is the Mahayana which means thegreater vehicle. It is called great because it involves very

great motivation, a vast view, and enormous practice.

TThe attitude of the bodhisattva who practices the Mahayana

is very great. First of all, he or she has an attitude of onlywishing for good and virtuous things to come to others and that

anything unvirtuous or harmful be eliminated. The Theravada

practitioners have this good attitude, but they mainly desire thedevelopment of their own progress and to have no obstacles or

negativity on their path to liberation. It is a healthy thing to

wish good things and progress for oneself, but if oneconcentrates too much on that and tries to develop only self-

interest there is the danger that it will eventually prevent

reaching enlighten-ment. The next vehicle of the Mahayanaprevents the obstacle of self-interest.

The attitude of the bodhisattva, a Mahayana practitioner, is

not being concerned just for oneself, but feeling the sameconcern for everyone. The reason a bodhisattva has unbiased

love and compassion is that when we identify with a certaingroup and concentrate only on that groups concerns, there isthe danger we might harm others outside the group. Therefore,

the Mahayana path cultivates a completely unbiased love and

compassion, caring equally for every being including

Courtesy Namo Buddha Publications(www.NamoBuddhaPublications.com)

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nonhuman beings such as animals. Normally, we care for ourfriends and relatives and helping them may set others against

us. Or we care for our race and set ourselves against other races

or cultures. Or we care for humans and subjugate animals inorder to make life better for mankind. All of this is the usual

way of biased thought.The Mahayana approach is to care equally for any sentientbeing (which is any being who has a mind). This is because we

realize that since beginningless time, each and every being has

had the same basic wish to find happiness and to be free from

suffering. In that respect, all beings are the same and thereforewe try to help them equally and without any partiality.

The Four Immeasurables

The attitude of the bodhisattva is to want to help all beings find

happiness and to relieve them of all their suffering. Thebodhisattva doesnt believe there are some beings who want

happiness and others who dont. The bodhisattva doesnt think

that there are some who need to be freed from suffering and

others who dont need to be freed from suffering. He or sherealizes that absolutely all beings need help to attain happiness

and all beings need to be liberated from suffering. So the

concern is for each and every being. In his commentaries,

Patrul Rinpoche stressed the need for meditating on

impartiality from the beginning of Buddhist practice.Normally, we meditate on the four immeasurables as they

appear in the prayers which is in the order of limitless love,

limitless compassion, limitless joy, and limitless impartiality.Patrul Rinpoche stresses the need for meditating on impartiality

first because this removes the danger of having partial or

biased love, partial or biased compassion. When we begin on


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the path, there is a strong tendency to have stronger lovetowards those we like and lesser love towards those we dont

like. Once we have developed wisdom with this meditation, it

becomes true love which cares for each and every personwithout any bias. This is the purest compassion because it is

impartial and equal.We meditate first to cultivate impartiality, then we go on tomeditate on great love, then on great compassion, and finally

on bodhichitta. The first immeasurable, impartiality, means not

being influenced by attachment or aggression. Great love

means wanting everyone to attain happiness. Great compassionmeans wanting to free everyone from suffering. Bodhichitta,

however, is subtler as it is the wish to attain Buddhahood to

help all beings. Its very nature is a loving and compassionatemind. What makes it subtle is that bodhichitta implies the

development of wisdom (Skt. prajna). Without that wisdom,

the love and compassion of the bodhisattva is incomplete loveand incomplete compassion. With this incomplete love, we

may really want to help others, but we may be ineffectual and

may even harm the person we want to help. With incomplete

compassion we really want to relieve the suffering of othersand yet we dont know how to free them of their suffering. So,

in the development of bodhichitta it is vital to develop our

wisdom and understanding along with our love andcompassion. This is the real meaning of bodhichitta and the

reason why it is subtle and difficult to cultivate.For example, suppose there was someone who was very

hungry and we didnt have sufficient wisdom, we might think,

Oh, theres an easy solution, I can show him how to fish. Weteach him how to fish and then in the short-term his hunger is

alleviated and he can care for himself. However, we have

shown him how to harm other beings12 and so this act will


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create negative karma which will bring him nothing but troubleand difficulties in the future. So, even though our motivation

was good and we exercised compassion, because of our

ignorance, we werent helping him at all, but made thesituation worse. In other words, we need to act with love and

compassion in a way that always brings good to all beings andtakes into account the future implications of the act. This is thewisdom of the bodhisattva.

Another way of acting through love and compassion is not

harming anyone. This is good in the short-term, but this doesnt

result in lasting benefit. For example, we can give a poorperson a gift of food and clothes. Although the motivation is

good and it doesnt harm anyone, there is relatively little

benefit because once the food or clothing are used up, theproblem returns. The bodhisattva aims for is a very great and

lasting benefit. So when a bodhisattva helps someone, he or she

tries always to give that person the very best, which is toestablish them on the very best path. If we can show someone

how to enter the supreme path, then the benefit is great and will

increase not just immediately, but throughout all time. This

doesnt harm others and helps the person develop in everyaspect. So the love, compassion, and care that the bodhisattva

has brings everyone to the supreme path and is really what is

meant by true love, compassion, and the activity of thebodhisattva.

The bodhisattvas pure motivation is extremely powerfuland skillful. For instance, communism also has a view or

philosophy, but spreading that philosophy involved great

armies, vast amounts of wealth, and a great deal of fighting andviolence. Even all those armies and military equipment didnt

really convince people of the truth of communism. In contrast,

the Buddha didnt spend millions to propagate his ideas or


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employ vast armies with sophisticated weapons to convincepeople of the validity of what he was saying. He just had a

begging bowl and taught many people. Because of his powerful

and pure motivation, his ideas touched millions and millions ofpeople and his teachings are still spreading. When the Buddha

taught the dharma, he did it with the greatest love for everyonewithout any bias. He did it without wishing to bring harm to asingle sentient being. He did it with a very pure compassion

and wisdom. After 2,500 years all of his teachings are still

perfectly intact and are still spreading and touching others

without any effort on the Buddhas part showing the power ofhis pure motivation.

The bodhisattvas motivation of the Mahayana is vast, far-

reaching, and extremely powerful. Of all the things that onetries to awaken in the Mahayana this motivation is really the

key. From the very beginning one tries to develop this very

vast and powerful attitude in which one develops love andcompassion along with wisdom that is unbiased and a genuine

desire to free everyone from suffering. This approach is the

very core of bodhichitta, the driving force or motivation. The

opposite of this is to have a biased mind and this selfishattitude poisons the environment. Bodhichitta, on the other

hand, is very beneficial for oneself and for all others. So, when

someone has bodhichitta, whatever he or she does, is likemedicine or healing nectar (Skt. amrita) which brings

calmness, peace, and the coolness discussed before. It is verybeneficial and is like a great and powerful medicine. It just

flows out quite spon-taneously and naturally from the presence

of ones bodhichitta. Take the supreme example of bodhichitta:when the Buddha taught, he led a very simple life and

everything happened spontaneously around him. These far-

reaching effects were a completely natural outflow of this very


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therapeutic healing, coming from the very pure motivationwhich he had. This is very special. If one looks, for instance, at

the Catholic church, one can see that it is a very powerful

organization and a great deal of effort goes into spreading thedoctrine as an organized business. There are missionaries and a

definite effort to spread the philosophy and view. Even thoughthere is all that effort and organization, it does not necessarilyspread the view of Catholicism. With the Buddhist dharma, in

contrast, there is the natural radiance of bodhichitta and the

activity of the Buddha which through his very pure mind

allows the dharma and its meaning to spread from one personto another in a very spontaneous and natural way.

The two main characteristics of the Buddhas activity are

its spontaneity and its lasting power. One can see how variouscultures of the past such as the Greek civilization influenced

the world and one can see how that influence was very short-

lived. The activity of the Buddha, however, is spreading andincreasing all the time without any break in continuity and is

always effective wherever it is. The Buddhas activity is also

always appropriate and fresh. In the first centuries after the

Buddhas passing away, the Buddhas activity was veryappropriate. Even 2,000 years later it is still very meaningful

and appropriate.

The view or approach of a bodhisattva to the Mahayanateachings is rooted in the second turning of the wheel of

dharma. This second main phase of Buddhas teachings iscalled the second turning or sometimes the intermediate

turning. The first turning was concerned with the Four Noble

Truths and was the basis for the Theravada. The second turningwas the main basis for the Mahayana. The main topic of the

Buddhas teaching in this turning is what is called voidness or

emptiness.13 The Buddha described the empty nature of both


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outer phenomena of the universe and inner phenomena in themind of the perceiver. Then later on, in the third turning, the

Buddha mainly taught about wisdom (Skt.jnana).

When Thrangu Rinpoche was in Germany there was oneperson who said that he appreciated Rinpoches teachings very

much, but when it came to the teachings on emptiness, theysomehow made him feel depressed and uncomfortable. He saidthat if Rinpoche taught more about the existence of something

rather than nonexistence of something, it would probably make

him feel better. Because of this discomfort, emptiness will be

explained in terms of the simultaneity of emptiness and inter-dependence called interdependent origination.


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Interdependent Origination

Properly speaking, all phenomena are empty. This emptiness,

however, does not mean phenomena are completelynonexistent. It is not a blankness of everything. What it means

is that all things depend upon one another for theirmanifestation because they are interrelated. What we have seenbefore is that we project a global idea of I onto what is in fact

many, many different things; so that when we look for the I

we cannot find it as a substantial entity. We find on closer

examination a complete absence of I, an emptiness of I.Yet, we can see that in the relative sense because of the way we

project this idea, there is a certain relative existence of the I

in terms of these projections. So, sometimes we associate thisidea of self with our body, sometimes with our consciousness,

and sometimes we even associate I or mine with the

country that we live in. Therefore, the idea of I is related tosomething, it is based on something, it depends on something

like the body or the idea of a country. And yet, when we look

for it, we cant find it. It is empty.

When one studies emptiness, one examines how thingsappear, that is, how existence manifests and is dependent on

everything being interdependent. All outer phenomena are

related and rest upon one another. Yet, when one looks for thethings being existent in themselves independently, one finds

emptiness; they simply dont exist.For instance, if I take a two-inch and a four-inch stick of

incense, the four-inch stick is the longer one and the two-inch

stick is the shorter one. If I show this to a hundred people andask, Which one is the longer one? they would all say that the

four-inch stick was definitely the longer one. Then when I add

a six-inch stick and remove the two-inch stick, the four-inch


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stick becomes the shorter one. If I ask a hundred people theywill all say that the six-inch stick is the longer one and the

four-inch stick is the shorter one. So I cant really say this is

long or this is short without seeing the interrelationship of thetwo. There is the relative definition of things and that definition

depends on other factors to which the thing is related. Thingsdepend upon one another; they are interdependent; and this isthe way all phenomena manifest to us. They dont have a

meaning and significance by themselves; their significance

emerges because of their relationship to other things.

There is an interdependence of all phenomena. That depen-dence applies to everything, but this dependence is particularly

strong in terms of the labeling and recognizing the mind of the

observer. If one takes away the observer with the ideas of long-short or large-small, then things by themselves dont have

largeness or smallness. It is only when an observer is present

and from this relative point of view decides that this is large,this is small, this is good, this is bad, this is beautiful, this is

ugly, etc. Without the observing mind, these characteristics

arent present. So, the pleasantness or unpleasantness of pheno-

mena depend upon the person relating to it. If someone isattached to an object thinking they want it, it becomes a nice

and desirable thing. If it is something they dont like, it

becomes distasteful, something to get rid of. All of thisdepends upon the observers mind; interdependence takes place

mainly between the defining mind and the apparent world.Thus, the way things are defined depends on the individual

who is observing and defining. For instance, if two tigers see

each other, they find each other quite attractive. They think,Oh, how nice when they see each other. However, when a

man sees a tiger, he thinks, Oh, this is terrible! not Oh, what

an attractive thing. Then the other way around, if two people


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meet each other they think, Oh, how nice. Thats my friend.Yet when a tiger sees someone, he doesnt think, Oh, thats

nice. Its a human. He thinks, Yum, food! So we see from

these different relationships that the quality of nice, attractive,food, or frightening is not contained within the object itself, but

depends upon who is relating to that object and the way welabel, define, and conceive of that object. We tend to label anddefine everything and we conceive of objects as real even

though our concept is based on a relative, dependent process;

things just manifest to us and because of this they have reality

for us.It should be obvious that the conventional existence of

things depends upon the mind of the observer. Because of this,

the Buddha gave teachings on the simultaneity of emptinessand interdependence and showed how these affect us. Inter-

dependence, relative existence, and emptiness go hand in hand;

the two are simultaneous and in combination. As we have seenin the example of the tigers and people, it is not that there is an

absolute quality permanently engraved into the object; it is a

relative quality that is there because of the observer. Because

of interdependence in the relative world, there is thismanifestation of these various relative qualities. Yet, when we

examine them closely, there is nothing of an absolute value to

be found in them. If we look for the absolute quality of beauty,edibility, or as we saw with the sticks, the absolute quality of

longness-shortness, bigness-smallness, etc. these qualitiescannot be found.

On the relative level, things continue to manifest to us,

even though on the ultimate level they are empty. This meansthat suffering and all things happen on a conventional level.

Yet, when we really search, we can never find the suffering,

only the emptiness of suffering. So, in our relative life, we have


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all these various experiences which are interdependent. In thisdeluded existence we produce the various disturbing emotions;

sometimes we are attached to things, sometimes we become

aggressive towards various people; sometimes we becomejealous or proud. The way to overcome these disturbing

emotions is not to work with the outer phenomena, but to workwith the mind which experiences these things. So, for instance,we have an enemy; we cant just get rid of the enemy because,

if we were to kill the enemy, then his or her mother, father,

brothers or sisters would end up being our enemies. So

destroying the outer enemy is not very practical. Whereas if wecan work with our mind which relates to that person as an

enemy and we can change that relationship to love and

compassion and patience with what is taking place, thesituation of an enemy is no longer there because the

interdependence between us and enemy has been changed.

To help us learn how to undergo this sort of transformation theBuddha taught the simultaneity of emptiness and inter-

dependence.

Conventional and Ultimate Truth

We may wonder if realizing the absolute or ultimate truth

doesnt make everyday life and ordinary things meaningless. Itdoes not because when we gain realization into the ultimate

nature of phenomena, everyday life does not contradict thisunderstanding, but is a part of it. This is called the realization

of the two truths. This means that we study the ultimate level

the way things (or phenomena) really are and on theconventional level we study the way things occur according to

the laws of interdependence. The conventional world has its

relative truth and the ultimate also has its truth. If it werent


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like that, ultimate truth would be called the truth andconventional truth would be called lies. But it is called the

ultimate truth and the conventional truth because it is

understanding the true nature of phenomena when we look atthe ultimate level or understanding the way phenomena

manifest when we look at the conventional level.When we realize both of these truths together, it helps us tolive in the relative and it is of great practical use. For instance,

if someone becomes angry and aggressive towards us,

normally we become excited and flare up and fight back. If we

realize that what is taking place is a relative and dependentsituation, and we are aware of the two truths, then we dont

need to strike back. Because we dont strike back, we dont

harm ourselves by generating negative karma and we dontharm the other person. So the two truths are useful. We can see

the two things happening: the relative situation emerging and

the value of the ground of ultimate truth.It is the same with desire. Normally we are subject to desire

and wanting things. If we cant get them, we become upset

thinking, I must have that. I cant carry on without it. or I

need it. And if we dont get it, our life becomes verymiserable. Or if we have something like a precious statue or

vase and one day it gets scratched or breaks, we become upset

and feel, Now it is ruined. I loved that thing. However, whenwe understand relative and ultimate truth, we realize there is

something useful to be learned if we get it or dont get it.Therefore we develop equanimity. We dont build a situation

of desire or become heart-broken if something gets scratched

or spoiled. So understanding the two truths enables us to livevery skillfully and once we have that deep realization, then we

still go on trying to make the relative world more beneficial. It

all becomes like a play or a dream. We are still working to


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make a beneficial situation, but because there is no longer anygrasping or attachment, we work in a more relaxed way.

We may think wanting to practice the dharma is also

grasping. But there is a difference between desire and desirefor good which is often called aspiration. In Tibetan these are

two different words. Desire (Tib. chagpa) means wantingthings for oneself. It has the feeling of attachment, involve-ment, grasping, and self-interest. Aspiration (Tib. mpa) has

the meaning of concern with positive things, of helping others,

and of seeing what is necessary and wishing to do what is

necessary and useful. As our wisdom and insight grows,hopefully, our desires will decrease. Our aspiration will

increase because of the increase of wisdom and insight. An

example of this might be that we fall asleep and begin to dreamof being attacked by a tiger. We are full of fear and if there is

someone nearby who is clairvoyant, he or she would see what

we are dreaming and would know we were dreaming of a tiger.So the clairvoyant wakes us up and says, There is no need to

be frightened of the tiger. Its just a dream. It is not really

there. When we see the true nature of things (ultimate truth),

our aspiration grows and we want to do what is beneficial anduseful. We are like the clairvoyant person and aspire to help

relieve the suffering we see in others.

The effect of attachment can be seen in the behavior ofcouples. If they are not very involved with each other and just

like each other, then they can have a sweet and smoothrelationship. But when they have great attachment and

involvement in each other, then it only takes one of them to go

somewhere for a few minutes or to talk to someone else tocause the other partner to ask, What did you say? What did

you do? Where did you go? One can see that great involve-

ment in the situation causes a lot of difficulties. When one


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develops wisdom, the attachment decreases and aspirationincreases.

At Namo Buddha in Nepal (where Thrangu Rinpoche has

his three-year retreat center) the Buddha in a former life gavehis body to the tigress and her cubs who were starving. There

was a great benefit to him when he saw the tigress and her cubsbefore him, because at that instant he realized that thethousands and thousands of previous physical lives had not

really served much benefit to beings. Each time that he died his

body was burned and buried, but it had not been of much use to

anyone. He could see that there was the opportunity to actuallyuse the substance of his body for some real benefit, to save

lives by feeding the tigress and her cubs. Because he had this

blend of compassion and wisdom, he knew that by giving sototally he would develop and perfect the perfection (Skt.

paramita) of generosity and through its karmic power would

give tremendous impetus to his development of wisdom in thefuture. The Buddha could then see not only the immediate

benefit of giving himself to the tigress, but also see how this

act would bring very great benefit in the future.

Luminous Clarity

The motivation and attitude of the bodhisattva and theMahayana practitioner are composed of two main elements: the

understanding of emptiness and the understanding of the

dharmadhatu aspect. These are the main topics of Buddhas

second turning of the wheel of dharma. With this view one sees

how everything is empty, but at the same time within thatemptiness everything takes place infallibly according to the

process of interdependence. The second main aspect of the

view of the bodhisattva is what is called the luminous clarity


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or the wisdom aspect. This is the main topic of the lastturning of the wheel of dharma. This emptiness is not a great

blank or voidness. If it were just that, it would be the very

opposite of the idea of manifestation. If there is just emptiness,then there can be no manifestation because the two are

incompatible with each other. To think of emptiness just interms of voidness is not correct because emptiness is the non-presence of a thing, it is its true essence. Nevertheless, through

a process of interdependence on a conventional level things do

manifest: they take place simultaneously with emptiness. So,

we cant think of emptiness in terms of just voidness becausethere is manifestation, yet when we look for the essence of the

emptiness, we cant find it. So this emptiness has the nature of

luminous clarity (Tib. salwa). The Tibetan word salwa isassociated with the brightness of sunlight or a very powerful

light. Once there is that brightness, everything can be seen and

distinguished very clearly. So the nature of emptiness isluminous clarity because it has the ability to let things manifest

very precisely from within it. This luminous clarity is

synonymous with the wisdom aspect of emptiness because

wisdom sees everything clearly. But that wisdom does not havea solid existence; therefore it is not an objective reality that we

can feel an aversion or an attraction towards it. The very nature

of this wisdom is emptiness. That is why we speak of the unionof wisdom and emptiness. When we look at the very essence of

emptiness, we find it contains this very wisdom, this clarity,that understands everything. By analyzing that wisdom we

discover no objective existence. So its very nature is emptiness;

at one and the same time there is wisdom and there isemptiness.

Buddha-nature


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The union of wisdom and emptiness is the essence of Buddha-

hood or what is called Buddha-nature (Skt. tathagatagarba)

which contains the very seed, the potential of Buddhahood.14Itresides in each and every being and because of this essential

nature, this heart nature, there is the possibility of reachingBuddhahood. Even though it is in everyone, it is not obviousnor does it manifest because it is obscured by the various

thoughts and disturbing emotions which block realization.

That Buddha-nature is present in each and every being but

does not always manifest. This is exemplified in the Uttara-

tantra by an image of a lotus flower, which is ugly when it is a

bud. But inside it there is a small and perfect Buddha statue. At

first one only sees this homely flower. Yet, when the flowerblossoms one can see the form of the Buddha, which has

always been there. Similarly, full Buddha-nature is in

everyones mind, yet its radiance and presence is covered up.Another example given in the Uttaratantra is of honey

surrounded by many bees. Honey is quite sweet and tasty but

as long as it is surrounded by bees, one cant taste that

sweetness. The example shows again that there is something atthe very heart, yet because of these swarms of bees which

represent our disturbing emotions, one cant gain access to

something which has been there all the time.The third example is of grains of rice inside their husks. To

get the nutritional value from the grains one has to remove theshell and husk. Whether one husks the grain or not, there is

always that same grain inside and as far as the grain is

concerned there is no difference. But if one wants to haveaccess to the nutritive value, one must remove the shell.

The example of the statue of the Buddha inside the lotus

shows how Buddha-nature is inside beings but is covered up by


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desires, attachments, and involvements. One has manydifferent disturbing emotions. The first main disturbing

emotion of attachment is represented by the lotus because

when one finds something very attractive, one wants to beinvolved with it. The lotus flower at one stage is very beautiful

and has a nice shape and color which is associated with beautyand attractiveness. Actually, when one considers it, the lotushas a very limited use apart from its beauty. Also that beauty

changesone day it very beautiful, the following days it wilts,

fades and rots and the beauty is gone. This is the very nature of

desireat one point things seem very attractive but veryquickly one realizes that they are not so useful or lasting as

they seemed. In the example of the lotus it is not until the

petals of the flower open and fall away that one can see theform of the Buddha that was there all the time. And it is the

same with desiresuntil ones desires have been eliminated,

one cannot see the Buddha-nature which has been insidesentient beings all the time.

The second example of honey points to the covering or

blocking presence of the second disturbing emotion of

aggression or anger which is characterized by bees. Honeyitself is very sweet and tasty. This is like Buddha-nature which

is very useful and beneficial for everyone. Yet, around the

honey are all those bees whose nature is the very opposite. Thebees sting and are very aggressive. As long as the bees are

there, the situation is very difficult. So it is with the nature ofaggression and anger which is also very unpleasant; it stings

and hurts. The honey is there all the time and one cant get to

the honey because the bees are all around it. If one can find away of gradually getting rid of the bees, one can get the honey.

Likewise, when one eliminates anger and aggression, one can

develop this really beneficial Buddha-nature.


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The third example of grains of rice inside their husks isused to point to the nature of the third main disturbing emotion

which is ignorance or confusion. The husk is very tough and

difficult to separate from the grain which makes it a goodexample of confusion which is also thick, strong, and difficult

to get rid of. This confusion prevents us from having access toBuddha-nature.Generally speaking, beings have a great deal of ignorance.

Compared to animals, of course, humans are more clever in

many respects and have more wisdom. But the wisdom of

humans is quite limited. For instance, humans like ourselvescant see what is happening beyond the walls of this room; they

cant see what is happening in the rest of the world. Knowledge

stops where the wall is. Even though humans can see otherpeople inside the walls, they have no idea apart from a few

vague indications whats happening inside of peoples mind

because human perception doesnt stretch that far. Even whenwe think we perceive others thoughts, we often make

mistakes. If we have a friend, for instance, the friend goes out

and we may start thinking, I wonder what he is saying about

me and we develop a whole train of thought and becomeconvinced that he is saying bad things about us. By the time he

comes back there can even be a fight just because we have

guessed the persons intentions wrongly. Or we may think anadversary is changing his intentions towards us by acting in an

open way which can also cause a lot of trouble if the enemy infact is still an enemy. It is hard for us to see things as they

really are.

When we learn about the Buddhas teachings, we learnabout the nature of desire, the nature of aversion, and so on. It

takes a long time for us to understand what is really being

taught. Even though we may know about the shortcomings of


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desire, yet due to our habitual patterns it takes a long time toact in a way which corresponds to our knowledge. The percep-

tion of the deeper aspects of truth is very hard for us to quickly

understand because ignorance is so pervasive. That is why it iscompared to the husk of a grain: It is tough, hard, and takes a

lot of effort to remove.These three examples show how Buddha-nature is like aprecious essence or jewel inside us, which is covered up by

desire, aggression, and ignorance. The Buddha taught the

dharma to show us how to have access to this precious

Buddha-nature.There is another example in the Uttaratantra which

illustrates this. Theres a very precious statue made of gold

which ages ago had fallen and became covered with dirt.Because no one knows its there, for generations and

generations people leave their rubbish there and it becomes

more and more covered because no one realizes it isunderground. One day a man who is clairvoyant comes along

and sees this precious golden statue under the ground. He then

tells someone, Do you know that there is a precious and

beautiful golden statue there under the ground. All you need todo is dig it up, clean it, and you will own this extremely

valuable thing. Someone with sense would heed the man, take

the statue out of the ground, clean it, and possess what has beenthere for such a long time. This example is very vivid: Since

the beginning of time this precious Buddha-nature has been inall beings, yet it has been covered with the dirt of the

disturbing emotions. Because one doesnt realize one has this

precious nature within, disturbing emotions build up. But thenthe Buddha who is like the man with clairvoyance tells us,

You know, there is Buddha-nature within you. All you need to

do is uncover and clean it so all the exceptional qualities it has


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will manifest. Those who heed the Buddhas teachings candiscover this incomparable thing which has been within us all

the time and which we never knew was there until we were

told. For that essence to be revealed we need to meditate on thetruth, on the essence of phenomena, the way things really are.

If we do that, we clean away all the delusions and disturbingemotions which have been covering up that essence. So wemeditate on the essence of everything which is emptiness.

Through meditation we will discover this emptiness has within

it wisdom and clarity. Through the process of becoming used

to the emptiness and luminous clarity which is the universalessence or dharmata we will automatically eliminate all of the

delusions which have been blocking that vision. Once we see

the truth of phenomena, all the deluded aspects cant exist atthe same time. So to clear away the obscurations and blockages

to Buddha-nature, we need first to know about the essence of

emptiness and clarity. Once we know it exists, we meditate onit to become closer and closer to Buddha-nature.

The Six Paramitas

The practice of the Mahayana of the bodhisattva is mainly

concerned with the six perfections or paramitas. There are in

fact ten15 paramitas but six of these are most commonly spokenof. So we will discuss the six paramitas which constitute the

bodhisattvas practice.The Buddha said that when we do dharma practice, it

should be done in a genuine and heartfelt way. This means that

when we practice dharma, we must not just do it as an outershow or pretense or like a theatrical performance where actors

dress up as kings and ministers even though they are not really

kings and ministers. We must practice dharma wholeheartedly


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and very properly with our body, speech, and mind. When weperform virtuous actions with our body, our mind should be

there also working for dharma. When we say things, our mind

should mean it as well. Practicing the dharma wholeheartedlyis very important. If we do a prostration, for instance, our mind

should also be filled with faith, devotion, and confidence tomake that prostration meaningful. But if we just prostrate withthe body and the mind is not involved with it, then it is more

like theater with us just going through the movements, but the

power is not there. It is the same when we recite mantras . If we

recite a mantra and at the same time our mind is visualizing,we are filled with certainty, confidence, and faith; then all the

power of the mind will be there and it will be a very good

practice. But if we just recite the mantras and our mind iselsewhere, then it is just a show and the power is not there. It is

not necessarily a bad thing to just do a prostration or a mantra

mouthing the words. It just means the power is not there; justas it is not necessarily a bad thing that people pretend to be

king and ministers in the theater. So, if we really want to get

everything possible out of practice, we need to do it very

sincerely and wholeheartedly with our body, speech, and mind.With this wholehearted approach the bodhisattvas practice

is the practice of the six paramitas. The first is generosity

which means giving. There is giving to those who are worse offthan us such as the poor, needy, and hungry. Then there is

giving to those who are better off than us which means offeringthem the three jewels. These are the two main areas of

generosity of the bodhisattva. When giving to those who are

worse off, what is important is compassion and when giving tothose who are better off what is important is faith, devotion,

and confidence. So when we give to the poor, it relieves their

poverty and hunger temporarily because of our compassion.


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When we make offerings to the three jewels, we make anexpression of devotion. If we never give to those worse off,

then compassion isnt there and it is not complete. In the same

way, if we dont make offerings to the three jewels, then ourfaith, confidence and appreciation in the meaning of the three

jewels isnt quite right either. So offerings are a very importantsign of what is going on in terms of compassion and devotion.Beside cultivating love, compassion, and devotion, the bodhi-

sattva also has to actually practice the paramita of generosity.

The second paramita is moral or virtuous conduct. The very

essence of virtuous conduct is that we do everything with loveand compassion so we do not directly harm other beings. If we

have love and compassion and yet harms other beings, it is a

sign that our love and compassion isnt really there. So, if weare loving and compassionate, we must really never harm other

beings. This is the bodhisattvas experience to love and

compassion. Therefore virtuous conduct is mainly concernedwith the discipline of practicing right conduct with our body

and speech so that we dont hurt others directly or indirectly.

Generosity and virtuous conduct depend mainly on ourself.

If we make an effort to be loving and compassionate, it isrelatively easy to develop generosity. Also, if we are loving

and compassionate, it is relatively easy to maintain high moral

conduct because this depends mainly on working with ourself.The third paramita deals with something more difficult. It

deals with how we react to situations arising from others,particularly what we do in the face of physical and verbal

aggression from others. This is the paramita of forbearance,

often called patience, which is remaining loving and com-passionate in the face of aggression. The training of patience is

the training of keeping our love and compassion in the face of

those difficulties which come from other people. So if our love


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and compassion is incredibly stable, when others hit us, nomatter how much they hurt us physically, we never respond in

a like manner. Our only response is one of love, compassion,

and understanding. In order to practice generosity, virtuousconduct, and patience in the face of difficulties, we need the

fourth paramita of diligence to implement the first threeparamitas and make them increase and become even morepowerful factors in our life.

Diligence doesnt mean some terrible drudge or difficult

effort. Rather it is very joyful, meaningful, and vital. If we

really think something has benefit, we value it, and we will doit very joyfully and out of this there is an automatic flow of

diligence and industry. If we think something is not very

important, then we will think it is a drag and a bore and we willdo a little bit and then become lazy and stop. Later we may try

to do a little bit more and stop again because of laziness.

Diligence means to practice without falling under theinfluence of laziness and practicing because we realize the

tremendous value of that practice. Once we have gained an

insight into its value, effortlessly there will be joy and keenness

to get on with it. Then automatically we will put lots and lots ofeffort into it to make it a very productive thing. We will

become diligent thus increasing the preceding paramitas.

The fifth paramita is meditative concentration. The Tibetanword for meditation is gom. This is the active word and the

word is derived from the root (Tib. khom) which means toaccustom oneself to something. So to meditate means to

commit and to accustom oneself to meditation. It really means

training the mind to settle. Even though we say my mind, themind which belongs to us is not under our control. Because we

have not worked on it very much, our mind tends to be very

distracted; it switches from one thing to another all the time.


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For instance, we may decide, I am not going to get angryanymore. Even though we decide this in one moment, we

dont have control over our mind and so we fall under the

influence of anger a little later. We may promise not to besubject to desires any more and then we lose control and our

mind is suddenly full of desires. So, we think my mind isunder my control, but when we look at it carefully there is notthat much control there. It is not like our hand. If we want the

hand to go somewhere, we can put it there. If we want it to

come back, we can bring it back. But the mind is not nearly so

tamed and doesnt respond to those commands so well. This ismainly because we havent really done much work in bringing

it under control. The word meditation has this implication of

training or habituating our mind so that it does what we want.We habituate our mind by meditating again and again. This is

the nature of meditation and the main point of the fifth

paramita is mental stability through meditation.The sixth paramita is wisdom or prajna in Sanskrit. How

much happiness we get out of worldly things depends on how

much understanding and wisdom we have. So wisdom is the

very root of happiness and joy and determines the value of allother things. In the ultimate sense the benefit that we can get

depends very much on our wisdom and understanding. Also the

ability to help others depends on the degree of our wisdom.Developing ourselves also depends on the degree to which we

have cultivated wisdom. For all these reasons wisdom andunderstanding are the very root of happiness and out of them

joy emerges. How then do we cultivate this wisdom? For a

Buddhist it is cultivated by the three main approaches ofstudying, contemplating, and meditating.

The Three Knowledges


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The first knowledge or prajna in Sanskrit is studying, an act

which does not have direct access to wisdom. We dont

naturally know how to develop wisdom, so we turn to theteachings of the Buddha. By studying the teachings, we begin

to grasp the ways to the development of wisdom. Now study initself will not bring the growth of much wisdom. We need togo on to the second prajna which is contemplation of the

teachings in which we think again and again about the meaning

of what we have studied to really get to the heart of it. Even

this wont bring about the highest, deepest, or ultimate benefit;we need to take the third prajna which is to meditate. It is

through meditation that we actually attain the ultimate

emergence of wisdom. Of the three main modes of developingwisdom, by far the most important one is the wisdom that

emerges from our meditation.

All beings have already within them Buddha-nature or thisBuddha-potential which has the essence of luminous clarity

and wisdom. This is the very highest wisdom, the power to

know everything very clearly and directly. All the power of

wisdom is already there, but it is still obscured. Until we havepurified the obscurations covering it, we cant use that wisdom

because we dont have access to the great clarity within us. We

see this even when we try to analyze a simple object. Betweenus and the thing we are trying to understand there is this

intermediate space full of thoughts. We interact with thingsthrough a great layer of intellectual activity or subtle

subconscious thoughts. It is therefore very hard to actually

know something directly because this constant interference ofthought takes place. If we study for even a few minutes a great

number of thoughts just pop up in our mind. From this we can


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begin to understand what an obstacle thoughts present to ouractual development and understanding.

When we meditate, the purpose of meditation is for our

mind to become stable and no longer distracted by theinfluence of thoughts. Our mind becomes calm and under

control. Once the mind is calm, we can have a much moredirect and immediate contact with reality and develop wisdommore rapidly. This is why the wisdom which develops in

meditation is important.

The Fruition

So far we have examined the view, the meditation, and the

practice in the Mahayana. Now we will move on to fruitionwhich is Buddhahood. The word for Buddha in Tibetan has

two syllables, sang gay. These show the two main qualities or

principle aspects of this highest goal of Buddhahood. The firstis the aspect of purity which means one is free from all the

impurities of the disturbing emotions, from ignorance, and

from all the obscurations. The syllable sang means

awakened, awakened from that sleep of ignorance, orpurified from that ignorance. The second syllable gay means

blossomed because being free from impurities, all of the

deep wisdom of the Buddha becomes present and this clarityand knowledge has completely blossomed and is completely

free from obscurations. So Buddhahood is the completeblossoming of the highest wisdom and purity.

The teachings of the Buddha can be divided into three main

levels or yanas which are the Hinayana (Theravada), theMahayana, and the Vajrayana. Another way of analyzing them

is to look at them in terms of the sutra and the tantra level of

teaching. The Sanskrit word sutra was translated into Tibetan


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as do which means teachings or explanation. Generally,the sutra level of teachings contains all of the explanations, all

the ways of presenting the vast meaning that the Buddha gave

in his life of teachings. So the sutra tradition is a way ofpresentation of the Buddhas teachings.

The other aspect is the tantra. When the Sanskrit wordtantra was translated into Tibetan, it became gyu, whichmeans continuum. Sometimes it is called mantra which in

Tibetan is ngak. This word continuum shows that there is

this presence of Buddha-nature in all sentient beings. They

have had this essence from the very beginning of existence andwill possess until they reach Buddhahood. So, by gradually

working on the path, step by step, one develops ones full

potential and reaches Buddhahood. This constant or continuouspresence within us is what is worked with in the tantric

teachings. These are teachings related to the Vajrayana which

will be discussed next.


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mahayana vehicle

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